Title: Dragonspeak
Characters: Blue-Eyes White Dragon/Kisara, & Yubel
Romance: References to Kisara x Priest Set and Yubel x Juudai
Chapters: 1-1||Words: 3,000
Genre: Romance, Friendship||Rated: PG-13
Challenges: Diversity Writing: YGO Intrafandom Crossovers: D40, romance genre; Advent 2014: YGO GX: day 11
Summary: Two people meet unexpectedly, have lunch together, talk about their boyfriends, and find they have more in common than they thought.

He waited fo her out there, somewhere. Yubel would know when he returned to the world in mortal form. She might not know where, but she would know when. Their hearts were inextricably woven together. She would accept no other answer. Juudai had pledged his love long ago and nothing would keep them apart.

Not time.

Not death.

Nothing.

Her heart wept still at the last memory she had of him, of him slipping away in her arms. How she had struggled to keep him with her, but his hand fell from hers and there was nothing, nothing there but a pale, empty shell.

She had screamed for days. She could not die. Why could he? Why could they be broken apart so easily? Why did this have to happen? Why?

When her screaming ceased, she'd left Kuragari. She did not wish to see the lovely island without Juudai with her. It meant nothing to her anymore.

For uncounted years she scoured the world, searching for any hint of when he would return to her. For he had to. So he'd pledged and so she knew in the deepest core of her soul. It could not be otherwise. It would not be otherwise.

Yubel no longer knew when she'd left the world where she and Juudai had lived so many happy years together. It simply seemed to her now that she'd done so in order to keep searching. If Juudai was not in this world, then perhaps he was in another, waiting for her.

Perhaps alone. Perhaps hurt, without her there. Certainly lonely, for it came clearer to her with each passing hour that no one could ever love him like she did. No one else would even try. No one would do what she had done for him.

And if they tried, they would fail. It was as simple and elegant as that. Only Yubel could or did love him with all of her essence. Only Yubel would sacrifice everything for him.

Had sacrificed everything for him.

He had made her a promise. A promise she would see kept, because Juudai always kept his promises and it would never be otherwise.

She no longer knew how long she'd traveled the worlds, seeking him endlessly. She recognized some of the creatures that she encountered, however, with more and more frequency. It surprised her when she first encountered the winged emerald warrior and he called himself Featherman. She'd known him by another name, once.

She did not find it odd that she no longer rememberd that name. Much of Kuragari had slipped out of her thoughts over the years. Only Juudai remained, and the words that hung burning like sweet dark fire in her soul.

No matter what anyone says, I will love only you.

She did not stay long with him or the others who'd once comprised Juudai's bodyguard. They were not on her level. They could not compare to her at all.

They did not remember her, either. She did not care why.

As time passed, she found others, some she remembered and some she did not. The world, all of the worlds, had changed, and she found herself being just a little more curious as to how and to why.

But she was not one to engage in casual conversation with anyone who wasn't Juudai and it was not her wont to linger in marketplaces to listen to gossip. So while she was curious, she did not feel the deep urge to assuage that curiosity.

If anything, she began to avoid those places where the others gathered. They were not like her, she told herself. They lived simple lives now, ones that had nothing at all to do with her endless search. They did not understand. No one would ever understand.

Until she found someone who did.

Yubel never cared to learn if the lands she traveled through had names of their own. She lumped them all together under one name: places where Juudai wasn't. What more description did she need?

So as she flew through a range of mountains, the thought of what they might be called or who might dwell among them did not occur to her. She'd seen signs that there were beings there, and all it meant to her was that she might ask them if they'd seen Juudai.

No one ever had. But she asked frequently. Not always. But sometimes.

The signs were subtle, but clear to her eyes, which could see through so much that was illusion. Claw marks, droppings, and not much game in the area gave away that whatever lived here, it was a powerful hunter, and probably one that meant to move soon to greener pastures.

The closer that she drew to the ground, the stronger the sense of something powerful beyond words became. Yubel took care to watch herself; there were few beings that could harm her, given her abilities, but some such did exist, and she would do nothing that might jeopardize her eventual reunion with her beloved Juudai.

Scales scraped against rock and Yubel froze where she was, alert to the slightest of sounds. From the dark yawning mouth of a cave there came a slither of silver, a waterfall of brilliant white that reflected all sunlight that fell upon it.

Yubel could feel power of many kinds. While this was not the Light that she and Juudai had long since pledged to fight, this was Light all the same. This was a protector, even as she was.

The great dragon turned toward her, wedge-shaped head tilted in curiosity.

"I don't get many visitors here. Who are you?" The voice was a woman's, soft and gentle. Yubel did not move from where she'd stopped.

"My name is Yubel," she replied, watching the great dragon. She'd always considered dragons kin, ever since the day when she'd been wrapped in dragonskin and dragonsblood and reborn in this new body. "Who are you?"

The dragon dipped down her head in greeting, wings spreading wide. Yubel spread her own in return, dragon instincts calling to her. "Sometimes I'm not certain. I am the Blue-Eyes White Dragon, or so I remember being called." Indeed, her eyes sparked as blue as the heavens above, like twin chips of sapphire. "But the name I bore once was Kisara."

Neither name meant anything to Yubel, but she knew that she'd traveled for long years and much could've happened in those years. She simply nodded in acceptance.

"I'm looking for my beloved. He perished many years ago in our homeland, and I've searched for his reborn soul ever since. Have you seen him?"

Kisara dropped her head down lower to face Yubel more directly. "I don't know. As I said, I don't get many visitors here. What does he look like?"

Yubel's lips tilted upward at once at the thought of Juudai. Picking the right words to describe him had never been easy, since most people didn't seem to agree with her belief that he was perfection incarnate. Only ones who'd never met him, of course.

"At his peak, he's tall and strong and handsome, with eyes of the warmest brown. When he uses his power, they glow as golden as the sun." He hadn't done that very often around her, but she'd seen it those few times and found it entrancing. Though in all truth, there was little about Juudai she didn't find wonderful. Even his bad qualities appealed to her. "He's impulsive and ignorant at times, insistent that he does what he pleases." Oh, had that annoyed King Aodh and Queen Kaien so many times! "But he has a good heart and wishes to help people." Even those who didn't deserve it. Sometimes especially those who didn't deserve it.

Slowly the great dragon shook her head. "I've seen no one like that here." A thoughtful look entered her own expression. "You've traveled far seeking him?"

"Very much so. I don't remember how long it's been since he passed on. Only that it's been a very long time."

"I, too, am waiting to find someone. I swore my eternal service to him once," Kisara said, a distant look in her glimmering eyes. "I stayed with him for as long as I could, but he passed on as well. I found myself here, then, and I've waited ever since." Her claws scraped thoughtfully over stone. "He was Set, High Priest and Pharaoh."

Yubel shook her head slowly. "I've never encountered anyone by that name." Not that she recalled, but in all fairness, she hadn't asked many names. But she thought she would have remembered meeting a king powerful enough to have such a great dragon defend him.

Kisara dipped her head slowly. "He will return. I know he will. And when he does, I will be there for him."

Yubel began to smile. "As I will be there for Juudai." She would search forever if she needed to. She would never give up. If Juudai hadn't yet been reborn, then she would find him when he was. That truly was the only reason that she hadn't found him yet: he wasn't there to be found. But he would be. They would fight the Light of Ruin together and end the threat it posed to the worlds.

Kisara's wings spread a little as she tilted her head up to the sky. "I plan to move my den soon. This place has little food left in it." She gave a smile that showed teeth sharp and bright enough to cause fear in almost anyone. Anyone who wasn't Yubel. "Would you care to hunt with me?"

Yubel seldom needed food; her bond to Juudai gave her all the nourishment that she needed. But it had been so long and the bond was stretched thin with his currently being inconveniently discorporated. A little food would not be amiss.

"If there's little here, then would there be enough for two?" She still didn't need much, but Kisara was much larger than she was, and would need a great deal of food to support herself. Yubel somewhat recalled having encountered dragons of a different breed in Kuragari, and they always needed huge amounts of food.

Kisara's claws scraped a little once more. "Perhaps. I know that I've caught sight of a large herd of cattle not that far away some days ago. I left them be at the time, as I'd already eaten. They could still be there."

That would be worth trying. Yubel nodded her agreement and stepped back, leaping up into the sky a heartbeat later. Kisara's great silver-white wings spread high and she launched herself, wings beating to catch the air. She circled a few times to orient herself, then turned toward the west where the sun colored the sky in sweet shades of scarlet.

"This way!" With a lash of her tail and a roar that shook the earth, the Blue-Eyes White Dragon shot forward. Yubel was only a scant breath behind her, her own black demon wings moving her as swiftly as Kisara's could. She wasn't as familiar with the area as her companion was, but she didn't need to be. She simply kept a wary eye out for anyone who thought they could steal the food that belonged to the rightful head of the food chain here.

The herd wasn't like the ones she remembered seeing, but that wasn't so surprising in this other world. These creatures were bright red, with patterns on their hides that would make a lovely tunic or cloak. Yubel wondered how Juudai would look garbed like that.

Kisara struck quickly, lifting two of the four-legged beasts out of the herd, one in each claw, and depositing them to the side. Then she returned for two more.

"This one for you," she told Yubel as she took a fifth and final one, dropping it next to the others. "Do you prefer yours cooked?"

Other memories flickered, the great feasts of Kuragari, the banquet hall, the times she'd sat there at Juudai's right hand. "Cooked," she agreed. Regardless of what some people had said of her after her transformation, she was not a ravening beast.

A few blasts of glistening fire from Kisara's mouth gave them both a delicious pile of cooked meat. It wasn't as neatly prepared as it might have been either in Kuragrai's kitchens or those of Kisara's beloved Set, but it would satisfy the both of them.

"This is a better meal than many I had when I was human," Kisara said, tearing a chunk of seared beef and swallowing it. "I spent most of my time then wandering, searching for anyplace that I could call home."

"My parents were not wealthy. We didn't have meat very often. Fish was much more plentiful for us," Yubel recalled. She hadn't thought much of those days in a very long time, even before her travels began. "Kuragari was -is – an island kingdom, and seafood was common there, even for the poorest. Meat was considered a delicacy. After I met Juudai, however, that changed for me."

She could see the curious tilt to Kisara's head and continued. "Even in Kuragari, there were those who found it easier to steal than anything else. My parents and I lived in a small home in a small village which was overrun by bandits." She stared down at the strips of meat in her hands, recalling. "Once they left, I was the only one left alive. They didn't know, I'm sure, or they would've changed that."

Kisara's wing brushed by her and Yubel glanced up to see shining blue eyes turned on her with kindness. She wasn't used to people who weren't Juudai looking at her like that and looked away.

"Juudai was the prince of Kuragari. He and his parents came by to see the results of the raid and do what they could. The moment he and I set eyes on one another..." Her voice trailed off, remembering that moment. Juudai insisted that she come with him and she hadn't protested. She'd had nowhere else to go anyway, and was too young to do anything to earn her keep.

"I traveled the world from the time I was very young. I was born... different from my parents," Kisara said, her voice distant as she recalled long-gone days. "I didn't know why then. But I wandered, searching for some kind of home, or answer. I found nothing, until I met him." Sapphire eyes softened in memory. "He saved me from death. Because of him, I eventually found out why I was different: because of the power of the dragon that lived within my soul. It wasn't a power that I could control, but to help him, after all he'd done for me, I was willing to try."

Yubel nodded; for Juudai, she would do anything. Strange how their stories paralleled one another.

"In the end, it cost me my life, but I found it a small coin to pay for being able to protect him for all time. There is nothing that I would change about what happened."

"Nor would I change anything. Juudai was born with a great power and a great destiny to protect all the worlds. His father, King Aodh, determined that until he could handle his power on his own, he needed a guardian. Someone whom no one could slay, who could protect Juudai forever. When he told me about this, I volunteered."

As if she would have ever let anyone else take on the task. As if anyone else would've even wanted to or tried to. Only she loved Juudai that much, or ever would.

"Dragonskin and dragonblood were used to transform me from what I was into what I am. Juudai swore afterward that he would always love only me." That moment on the rocks was forever seared into her soul. She'd taken him out there to try out her new wings, and he'd held her close to him, still amazed that she'd done such a thing for him.

"And you love him as well?" Despite the tone, it didn't feel like a question. But she nodded her answer regardless. "I hope that you find him soon."

Yubel rose to her feet, her meal completed. "As do I." She glanced at the great dragon, and wondered if this was what it felt like to have a friend. She'd spent little time with anyone who wasn't Juudai before, and he'd always been her everything. "As I wish for you to find yours as well."

Kisara bent her head. "He will come. They will come."

Yubel rested one hand on the gleaming silver muzzle for a single moment. As she did, an image came into her mind, of a young woman gowned in a simple, plain smock, with hair as bright as Kisara's scales and eyes as blue as heaven.

This is who she was. Now her earlier words made the images much clearer. As humans judged, Kisara was beautiful.

Kisara's gaze focused on her and Yubel wondered if the dragon saw her as she'd been as a human. If she did, she said nothing of the sort.

"It's time for me to leave," Yubel said. Her quest called her, as it always would until the day she and Juudai held one another once again.

"Farewell, then, Yubel." Kisara spread her wings and prepared to return to her lair.

"Good hunting to you, Kisara, Blue-Eyes White Dragon," Yubel said, her own wings spreading. She hoped the day would come when they met again, preferably with their own loves with them. What a wonderful reunion that would be.

She took off, soon losing sight of the other dragon as she coursed through the dark night skies. Somewhere out there Juudai waited for her or would wait for her, and she would find him. No matter how long it took.

He'd made a promise and she would never let that slip away.

The End